I feel StartingStrength is biased towards the interests of profesional athletes and StrongLifts is better for the regular person.

But the important switch is realizing that your job is not who you are, it just pays the bills. Your lifestyle, of which your exercise routine is a key part IS who you are in that it actually transforms your physical being, affecting both your job and every other aspect of your life.

You don't need to use a particular exercise regime, but you should understand that taking it seriously is about keeping "you the tool" in working order, whereas a job is just one in a long line of uses of "you the tool".

I disagree that SS is geared towards professional athletes. What makes you think so? Ive done both, StrongLift is simply not sustainable especially for a beginner.

I have over 15 years experimenting with exercise routines, which has lead me steadily to the 5x5 domain, and for me the most notable difference between SS vs SL is that StartingStrength advocates techniques that are potentially more beneficial if you are already competent, or you are already engaged in a profession where failing at the StartingStrength exercises is a lesser risk than your day job.

By comparison StrongLifts advocates techniques that are less likely to result in injuries for amateurs (less ballistic, less technique sensitive). Personally, I'm quite comfortable with StartingStrength, but I have reservations recommending it to beginners.

Ultimately I don't follow either, but rather my own variation of a 5x5 routine (which both StartingStrength and StrongLifts are variations of) ... but advocating 'what works for me' without supporting documentation would be irresponsible, and I'm too lazy to write it up.

So I advocate StrongLifts.

I would say that a year plus into StrongLifts you should at least evaluate StartingStrength in case it suits you better.